Old Friends Pt. 1: First Glance
by Jarcanda
Summary: Ghent, the Slicer from The Hand of Thrawn Duology is shown in his early life, and we see how he got his start in slicing, in a way that dramtically influences him.


Arrival on Salend 6  
  
Salend 6 was like so many other worlds, an oft ignored, seedy, backwater planet. That made it the perfect place for the young man riding in the passenger seat of an old model Corellian ship to go. He wasn't too sure of the name of the pilot, or what his purpose was in going to Salend 6. Details like that didn't matter to Zakarisz Ghent. All he knew was that upon arrival at Salend 6, he had to slice into the main computer network of the planet and get some information for the pilot of the ship. That was how he had bought himself passage to Salend to begin with. His slicing skills in return for a ride somewhere, didn't matter where, as long as he got off of his home planet, he was happy. At the age of 16 Ghent had run away from his home, his family, his whole life. Life as the son of a prosperous family of industrialists didn't appeal to him. While his brother, sisters, mother and father were building their lives as affluent socialites and nobles of free trade, Ghent preferred the company of the computer networks. To him, it seemed as if all his life had been spent learning to manipulate them, and anything else held little importance. As he looked out the transparisteel view ports on the battered old ship, he reflected on his decision to leave home. He had dreamed of leaving ever since he was a child, but it was not until the day he visited his mother in her office, and saw the life he would one day be forced into by his family, a life of constantly fielding comm. calls and reassuring investors, that he finally gave up on trying to accept it, and fled. He had no people skills, and even more, no desire to deal with any one. Life was best lived connected illegally to a network, not connected to other beings. Leaving was simple. He had hastily used his skills to get a decent amount of credits from his family's account. He had been sloppy, and would be discovered quickly, but hopefully he would be gone by then, hiding on some obscure outer rim planet. And then he had run to the spaceport gotten on the first ship that had a pilot willing to give him passage, and just left.  
  
The Corellian freighter landed in a disreputable looking docking bay. This was it, Zakarisz Ghent had succeed in making it off world, now all he needed to do was get the information for his pilot and he would be free. Free to do what, though, he suddenly wondered. He had his skill, some credits, and little else. As he walked down the ramp of the ship and through the docking bay, lost in his sudden panic, he managed to walk directly into a young Zeltron woman wearing a black jumpsuit. "Sorry," he mumbled, not noticing the other people in the docking bay staring at him, or the way she was angrily cursing at him, her pretty face contorted in rage. The hardened spacers populating the duracrete lined hole in the ground laughed at what was to them a young awkward looking boy who would be dead on this planet quicker then a Quarren in Tatooine sun. Ghent made it to a computer terminal with no other trouble, and within five standard minutes had retrieved the information for his pilot. He handed over the information cylinder. "This should be just what you wanted." Ghent had no idea why the man desired to know the time schedule of the New Republic convoy's refueling stops on Salend 6, but it mattered not a bit to him. All governments seemed the same to young Ghent, and it never even occurred to him that the information might be used against the New Republic. Not that he would have cared if he did. All his life he had seen his family work around the government, Empire and New Republic, and probably the Old Republic before that, dodge the system, respect it little, and never get caught. That was the one aspect of his family that didn't repulse him. The one aspect that would remain with him for a long time. Once again, Ghent was snapped back to reality by some one in the docking bay. A New Republic official of some sort, probably off-duty on one of those stopovers mentioned in the info Ghent had just stolen. "What are you doing?" the disheveled looking man in the uniform of the infant government asked? Ghent stammered, "Uh, I'm, I'm, I was just looking up information, about when my uh flight leaves, it's all good." "Well, you just seemed awful interested in what you were looking at," the official replied. "Aren't you a little young to be traveling by yourself?" he mused, making Ghent even more nervous. "No, no, I'm not really that young, I uh, just look it." The man he was talking to didn't seem convinced, but also didn't seem to want to waste time talking to the nervous youth. Ghent was horribly relieved when, with a final strange look, the man left. I need a disguise, he realized, I'm suspicious enough, and if my family has people out looking for me, they'll find me instantly. With those thoughts, Ghent went off in search of a disguise, not realizing what a scene he was making in the docking bay of cynical travelers, by once again bumping into several people on his way out. 


End file.
